Alas for the sad standards
In the eyes of the old masters
Sprouting through glaze of their pictures!
For what we stare at through glass
Opens on to our running time:
As nature spilled before the summer mansion
Pours through windows in on our dimension.
And the propeller's rigid transparent flicker
To airman over continental ranges
Between him and the towns and river
Spells dynamics of this rotating
Age of invention, too rapid for sight.
Varnish over paint and dust across glass:
Stare back, remote, the static drum;
The locked ripeness of the Centaurs' feast;
The blowing flags, frozen stiff
In a cracked fog, and the facing
Reproach of self-portraits.
Alas for the sad standards
In the eyes of the freshly dead young
Sprawled in the mud of battle.
-26-
